Glenn Tomlinson, age 9, of Santa Cruz, CA, for his question:
ARE NUTS RICH IN FOOD VALUE?
Kernels taken from most edible nuts form highly concentrated foods, rich in protein. Most nuts are rich in fat, except the chestnut and a few others, which are fairly high in starch. Nuts are definitely rich in food value since they provide humans with an important source of protein.
In parts of Europe, nuts form a large part of the regular diet. Bread is sometimes baked from a flour made from chestnuts.
Persian or English walnut, pecan, almond, cashew, pistachio, hickory, black walnut, Brazil nut, filbert or hazelnut, macadamia and chestnut are the most popular nuts in the United States and Canada.
The term nut may mean the shell as well as the meat inside, or it may refer only to the seed of the fruit, as with the almond. The nut may be one of a large number of seeds lying inside a cone, like the pine nut or Indian nut.
In the markets of the United States, whole nuts are called in shell, or unshelled nuts. Those with their shells removed are called shelled nuts, kernels or nut meats.
The 10 leading nut growing states in the United States, listed in order of importance, are Georgia, California, Alabama, Texas, North Carolina, Virginia, Oklahoma, Florida, South Carolina and New Mexico.
The Persian walnut is usually called the English walnut, although it probably was grown originally in Asia. It is one of the most popular nuts available, and it is also one of the most nutritious. Many walnuts are now grown in California.
There are many pecan orchards in the southern and southwestern states. Almonds are also grown extensively with most of the American crop coming from California.
Peanuts belong in a separate class. They are a relative of peas and beans.
Several types of nuts come from the tropips. Most popular, perhaps, is the coconut that is commercially important in many parts of the tropics.
The macadamia nut, sometimes called the Queensland nut or Australian nut, has a thin hard shell, but the kernel is good to eat. It is the fruit of an evergreen tree that comes from Australia and it is now grown in Hawaii and parts of the American tropics.
Some macadamia trees are also producing now in California and Florida.
Water chestnut, sometimes called water caltrop or Jesuit nut, is the seed of a water plant that grows in Europe. A closely related plant called Singhara nut, or horn nut, comes from southern Asia.
Nut trees are pollinated by wind or insects. Varieties of species of nut trees are often crossed. Parts of one variety are grafted or joined to the rootstock of another variety.
Those nut trees which come from Europe grow better in the western part of the United States than in the East. Those transplanted from eastern Asia seem to do better in the eastern states.